{"id":7675,"date":"2010-06-24T17:25:12","date_gmt":"2010-06-24T17:25:12","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/wordpress\/?p=7675"},"modified":"2017-05-15T02:39:09","modified_gmt":"2017-05-15T02:39:09","slug":"black-female-agency-and-sexual-exploitation-quadroon-balls-and-placage-relationships","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=7675","title":{"rendered":"Black Female Agency and Sexual Exploitation: Quadroon Balls and Pla\u00e7age Relationships"},"content":{"rendered":"

Black Female Agency and Sexual Exploitation: Quadroon Balls and Pla\u00e7age Relationships<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Ohio State University
\nMay 2008
\n81 Pages<\/p>\n

No\u00ebl Voltz<\/strong>
\nThe Ohio State University<\/em><\/p>\n

A Senior Honors Thesis Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for graduation with research distinction in the undergraduate colleges of The Ohio State University<\/em><\/p>\n

In 1805, a New Orleans<\/a> newspaper advertisement formally defined a new social institution, the infamous Quadroon Ball<\/a>, in which prostitution and pla\u00e7age<\/a>\u2013a system of concubinage<\/a>\u2013converged. These elegant balls, limited to upper-class white men and free \u201cquadroon<\/a>\u201d women, became interracial rendezvous that provided evening entertainment and the possibility of forming sexual liaisons in exchange for financial \u201csponsorship.\u201d It is the contention of this thesis such \u201csponsored\u201d relationships between white men and free women of color in New Orleans<\/a> enabled these women to use sex as a means of gaining social standing, protection, and money. In addition, although these arrangements reflected a form of sexual exploitation, quadroon women were able to become active agents in their quest for upward social mobility.<\/p>\n

Until recently, historians have overlooked the lives of Louisiana\u2019s free women of color during the colonial and antebellum<\/a> eras. My research, therefore, expands historical knowledge about the unique social institution of Quadroon Balls and pla\u00e7age relationships in order to give greater breadth to scholarly understandings of quadroon women\u2019s sexual and economic choices. This research formally began in summer 2006, during my participation in the Summer Research Opportunities Program (SROP) at the Ohio State University. Through this experience, I was able to begin analyzing the institution of Quadroon Balls and I have discovered the immense possibilities of this topic. While there are many directions that this research can take, I have decided to focus my undergraduate research and honors thesis on the history of the balls and quadroon women\u2019s agency in antebellum New Orleans. In order to research these concepts, I have utilized a combination of primary sources and secondary sources written about women of color. In winter 2006, I was awarded an Undergraduate Research Scholarship and, with this money, I visited New Orleans and Baton Rouge to conduct archival research. My most recent trip to New Orleans and Baton Rouge<\/a> has augmented my understanding of the topic by providing a large quantity of primary source materials, including court cases and other legal documents, as well as affording me an opportunity to experience archival research first hand in the actual historical environment in which the balls took place. Ultimately, I plan to continue my current research as my dissertation topic.<\/p>\n

Table of Contents<\/strong><\/p>\n

Acknowledgments<\/em>
\n Abstract<\/em>
\n\u201cThe Quadroon Ballroom\u201d Poem by Rixford J. Lincoln
\nIntroduction and Historiographic Review
\nChapter 1. A Historical Background of New Orleans\u2019 Free Women of Color
\nChapter 2. Pla\u00e7age Relationships
\nChapter 3. Quadroon Balls
\nChapter 4. Case Study: Five Generations of Women
\nConclusion
\nAppendix<\/em>
\n Bibliography<\/em><\/p>\n

Read the entire paper here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In 1805, a New Orleans newspaper advertisement formally defined a new social institution, the infamous Quadroon Ball, in which prostitution and pla\u00e7age\u2013a system of concubinage\u2013converged. These elegant balls, limited to upper-class white men and free \u201cquadroon\u201d women, became interracial rendezvous that provided evening entertainment and the possibility of forming sexual liaisons in exchange for financial \u201csponsorship.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[838,459,369,8,20,25],"tags":[20754,1438,3177,3178],"class_list":["post-7675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dissertations","category-history","category-louisiana","category-media-archive","category-usa","category-women","tag-louisiana","tag-new-orleans","tag-noel-voltz","tag-placage"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7675"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7675\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53927,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7675\/revisions\/53927"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}